HEAR'SAY

Hello folks, and yes it's official I am now an octogenarian. Well in the literary sense at any rate. With this the eightieth edition of hearsay. I only wish I had some celebratory gimmick up my sleeve to be going on with, but alas I have none, I guess I'll just leave that to the politicians. Of course it was rumoured some time ago now that the network rail (one) railway line was to be linked up to the chuff chuff line to Holt and beyond. I just wish someone could have told the train driver! That that was just a rumour and not really reality, before he decided to try out the theory for himself without first properly testing out the suitability of the line beyond the buffers and Shering-henge the other day! Still it gave the town some long yearned for excitement for a change. The last time an accident of this calibre happened the train managed to travel into the then, car park before coming to rest. This last little misdemeanour wasn't quite that drastic. It must be some time since so many emergency vehicles have turned up at the same time and place in Sheringham. Alas not so for the coaches who were hired for the long suffering passengers. For whom this kind of travel experience seems to be becoming more of the norm rather than an isolated hitch.

Many of you may have read in recent local daily's that Cromer "pah" I spit in it's general direction! Have called in its chips for the fate of its many business's "A" boards and model butcher adorning its streets. This new clampdown directive, we understand, was on a whim of some "member of the public" Let's call him/her Jo for arguments sake, who happened to complain that he or she had a tumble with some unspecified street furniture and this led to direct action! Just one complaint!? Blimey, just think if it was that easy to get something done about someone not looking where they were going, how is it then this Tesco debacle has taken the best part of 15 years with countless thousands of opinions? Whoever it was, this person must have been pretty important. I just hope they never take it upon themselves to inveigle their way round Sheringham streets to the same purpose. As one might argue that poor Mr.50 wouldn't stand a chance on that corner of his. What of the (semi-help yourself store whilst we're at lunch,) Blyth and Wrights or dare I say Crowes and the three greengrocers. Heaven forbid we're all told like naughty children to put our boxes away as if they were toys. And just where does it stop? Does "street furniture" and "advertising hostings" stretch to seats, Sheringham in Bloom pots and our dear old favourite Shering- Henge and post boxes? Not to mention umpteen lamp/hanging flower standards, mandolin playing school children on a Saturday and loitering charity box collectors outside Woolworth's. Are all these to be taken into consideration as well? Who knows where it will stop! It just seems to me like a knee jerk reaction to take a hammer to crack a nut. Pity someone with some sense didn't do the same to that council. Well I can tell you this for nothing, I for one am revolting! In the anarchy sense of the word if it happens here and I would urge you all to put up a fight to stop this thing here before it happens. I mean, where would we be if we didn't have half a tonne of veg. on the pavement to show that the shop was a greengrocers. Or indeed that we'd never know where the chemist's shop was if it wasn't for the half a dozen blue badged cars parked just outside. Yes good citizens of this Sheringham parish. This is indeed a breech of our civil rights, to tumble over tied up leaded dogs that have been abandoned to these "A boards". It is my right to know in which direction I have to go to get to the hairdressers and exactly what current offer they have on hair. Yes people of Sheringham it is time to stand up and be counted, what? All right, all right, I know, I know it's time to get off the soapbox and start writing Ming's triumphant winning Election speech, oh sorry, just fell of my toadstool then day dreaming! Never mind back to reality. And yes it is at that time of year when Halloween approaches, it's a time of witches and goblins and sticky chocolate-covered kids who hover on your doorstep and beg for money and e-numbers, and where nasty and disturbing things can come through your letterbox. Like long lost bills after the postal strike, invites to cold autumn family weddings in Skegness and worst of all, early Christmas cards from overseas relatives who post early just so as to prolong the misery of the season even more than necessary. Oh how I love to adorn my lounge with the results from a small forest in the Rhine from mid October! Thank God for Horlicks, Michael Palin and Facebook. And not forgetting the Little Theatre, the wind swept solitude of our promenade and Turkish Delight ice cream sold in a chocolate topped cone, without which one might be encouraged to go a little mad prematurely. And it is on that not that I bid you farewell until our next issue. Now I've gone and made myself hungry. Take care now Vic.